


To Think of Love as Something New

by bunnoculars



Category: The Beatles
Genre: Dubious Consent, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-10-06
Updated: 2010-10-06
Packaged: 2019-04-19 06:54:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,200
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14231727
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bunnoculars/pseuds/bunnoculars
Summary: John has Paul-related difficulties after he screwed up their relationship. Set in 1965,Rubber Soulera.





	To Think of Love as Something New

**Author's Note:**

> Initially I was not planning on reposting this story. I have a lot of issues with the way I dealt with some topics, and a lot of ways I think I failed the story I was trying to tell, but I could say that about most of the the things I post/have posted here. At the end of the day, the only real reason I had for taking it offline is that I personally hate it.
> 
> The thing is, it was already online for almost ten years. So here it is again, for anyone who wants to read it. I'm sorry to anyone at JHP that I put through the trouble of saving this thing off my LJ.
> 
> The dubcon occurs within the italicized flashbacks.

Sometimes John wondered what the bloody point of being a Beatle was if he couldn’t do as he fucking well pleased like the next man, wondered how it worked out that all those years spent scrabbling up out of the shithole had ended up being better than the years on top.

Of course, he didn’t always think so, not with the great big house in Kenwood and the heaps of cash coming in and the studio at Abbey Road to muck around in, but at times like these, when he was stuck like an ape on display at some ridiculous social function, he wondered.

“John Lennon, I presume?” a man at his elbow lisped at him.

“Yeah, that’s right,” John said, glancing round at him, taking in the martini glass and the round shiny face and the patterned bowtie, an oddly repulsive bit of personality against an impeccable suit—an attempt at personality, more like, because John could tell he was just another boring old fag, one of Brian’s society friends.

The man beamed, bobbing closer, hand fluttering out for a shake; John accepted it because he had no excuse not to, found his palm too soft and slick with perspiration.

“Just as I expected then,” the man tittered at him delightedly, as if the feel of his hand was some kind of personal revelation. “Of course, Brian’s told me all about you.”

John snorted derisively, eyes already elsewhere, mind never having been there in the first place. “In that case might as well fuck off, yeah? Nothing new to see here.”

There was spluttering and an indignant sniff and then the man was gone, leaving John to toss back his own drink bitterly and get back to watching Paul, who was sitting on a sofa with another queer slobbering all over him and living it up from the looks of it. Which had been going on for about an hour now, or at least to John it had seemed like a bloody hour (a fucking eternity, more like), since he started taking notice—

Fuckin’ hell.

“Having a good time, John?”

George. George wasn’t Brian or another one of his little friends, that much could be said for him. John took another drink, wished he could get properly smashed.

“Thought you liked Brian’s parties,” George pressed, giving him a side eye. John glared at him, not bothered to answer—maybe if it had been Ringo, he would’ve (Ringo was too nice not to feel some guilt), or _Paul_ —

“That one just now get too friendly, like?” George said at length, perhaps mistaking John’s expression, smirking.

“Brian’s been bragging to the other lads, no doubt,” John sneered, and although he never would’ve said it himself, George snickered like he was thinking the same thing. And then something clawed at John inside as Paul laughed too, at something his friend the queer had said, leaning in a touch—and then the fucker clasped Paul’s knee briefly, thumb stroking the material of his slacks, and it was too fucking long and too fucking much from where John was standing—

“ _Paul’s_ the one looking to get jumped,” he said loudly, the anger that was bubbling in his gut all evening searing up suddenly, overwhelmingly. “Look at that bloke he’s with, pawing at him.”

“Can’t help himself, can he?” George said reasonably, sniggering. “Try to charm a bloody brick, ‘d Paul.”

“Well, bricks don’t get the fuckin’ idea they’re going to make it with him, do they?” John said sharply. “That fucker probably thinks he’s made him already.”

There was a sudden, distinct pause.

“Paul’s not queer, John,” George said quietly, finally, cottoning on now that this wasn’t such a joke to John for some reason or other.

“That’s all you know of it,” John said, voice harsh. “Christ, that’s all Paul knows of it, too. It makes me fuckin’ sick.”

“Like you and Brian?” George prodded, face stoic with a quiet sort of daring, daring to bring up a topic that could set John off faster than anything in such a mood.

But John wasn’t listening, because Paul and the man had just gotten down to smoking and Paul leaned in as the bloody poofter offered him a light—hands close so close to his face—and then as he lifted away and Paul took a drag his hand flitted to Paul’s hair, there and gone so quickly that John might’ve thought he’d imagined it if it hadn’t been burned into his mind—

George started to say something more, but John didn’t hear, he was crossing the room and in an instant he was standing in front of the two of them. It was strange how little distance there had been between them—had seemed like the fucking English Channel when he was watching them—but now here he was. The fellow faltered, broke off what he was saying, looked up at him through a wreath of blue-gray smoke.

“Ah, _the_ John Lennon!” he exclaimed, and when his extended hand was ignored, a polite, plastic smile settled onto his face. His voice was just as polished, like some bloody BBC commentator, and John loathed it just as much as he loathed everything about him—his tweed sports coat, his fastidiously combed hair, his stupid little mustache.

Paul nodded towards the man, smiling up at him in greeting. “This here’s Monty, John. Says he’s written a bit of poetry.”

John flashed a look at him, but couldn’t ignore that like old Monty’s hand. “Well, that’s a bit predictable, isn’t it, love?”

He exulted briefly in the uncomfortable silence that followed, Paul giving a startled look from John to his new friend.

“I’m afraid I’ve heard a bit about your sense of humor, Mr. Lennon,” Monty said crisply, straightening his jacket and brushing away some invisible specs of ash. “Charming.”

“Oh, John’s always good for a laugh,” Paul said distractedly, regarding him more intently now over his cigarette, undoubtedly trying to figure out what’d put him out of order. John had always hated him doing that, especially now, when fucking Monty was smiling indulgently at Paul and patting his knee again, as if commiserating with him on account of John being an unfortunate catch to their making a lovely evening of it. Anger roared up inside of him—he wanted to rip the fucker limb from limb for even thinking about it—about doing _that_ , fucking anything at all, to Paul—

“I don’t suppose you’d care to join us,” Monty offered thinly. “Being a songwriter I’m sure you could find it in you to spare some time for a poet—practically the same craft, after all.”

John made a low, noncommittal noise in his throat, too busy trying to find some semblance of self-control to answer, though the bastard seemed to take it as a sign of encouragement.

“We’ve been having the most wonderful chat, really,” he said, “Paul and I.”

“Chatting isn’t all you’re fuckin’ out to do with Paul, though, is it?” John said, voice oddly cold to his own ears, ears pounding with blood, hands curling into fists.

“ _What_?” squawked Monty, visibly affronted and unsettled, as though he didn’t quite know what to make of John, or this situation.

John heard him vaguely, his rage crashing over him dangerously, but luckily for him—or for all of them, perhaps—Paul knew what to make of the situation and in a second he had leapt up and grabbed John’s elbow and dragged him towards the door, muttering, “Let’s get the fuck out of here.”

 

“What the bloody hell was that about, John?” Paul asked him as soon as they burst out into the chill October night.

“Bugger was a right cunt, is what,” John muttered, fishing in his pockets for a cigarette and coming up dry. “Give us a ciggie.”

“Why did you—” Paul began and then broke off wearily, frowning, as he proffered John a ciggie. “He was a good bloke, John.”

“S’pose you’d think so, cozied up with him all evening,” John sneered between clenched teeth as he lit up and took a long drag, before expelling smoke in Paul’s face. “Read his poems to you, did he?”

“What?” Paul snorted in disbelief, a hint of laughter in his voice that brought some level of shame, some level of restraint back to John. They walked in silence, no particular destination in mind, and it was a while before Paul spoke again.

“So what’s bothering you, really?”

John scowled at him, taking one last drag before flicking his ciggie away and taking some small savage pleasure in stamping it out. “Just drop it, yeah?”

He couldn’t explain why it made him more angry than relieved to see Paul nod, a slight, almost imperceptible movement in the night; John could see his eyes glistening, though, studying him, dark and endless as the sky. “Could fancy a joint right now,” Paul offered after a moment, tilting his head invitingly.

Somehow the hazy oblivion of pot was unfit for this older, twisted pain.

“Let’s go for a drink,” he said. “Get plastered.”

 

 

“Where the fuck are we?” Paul asked, rubbing at his eyes and staggering into John, who nudged him off; Paul was always a hopeless drunk.

“’Fuck should I know?” John replied, feeling some pathetic thrill at the thought—wow, a Beatle out and about, out on his own with another Beatle! Two drunken Beatles on the loose—fancy that!

“Should call a taxi, we should,” Paul said after a minute, not seeming too urgent about it, but John at his words felt as if the bloody zoo keeper was breathing down his neck, felt a sick swoop in the pit of his stomach.

“Let’s just walk for a fuckin’ bit,” he said roughly, a little too violently perhaps, because Paul was looking at him, all wide eyes and furrowed brow. But he couldn’t help it, he just wanted to walk for a bit…just wanted to be two people on the loose, on a walk, John and Paul on a walk…

Just John and Paul…

He stumbled slightly as the ground seemed to lurch up at him, righting himself, but then Paul was reeling into him again…or was it him who ran into Paul?

“Bloody lightweight,” John muttered, regardless, because it was the bloody truth. Paul hummed in agreement, the noise soft and absent, and then he was lifting John’s arm over his shoulders, and then they were staggering again and John grabbed at Paul’s coat, fingers curling tightly over the collar.

They had gone to a club after Brian’s party and proceeded to get smashed together, though John thought Paul might’ve fallen behind him at some point…he’d lost track of the number of drinks he’d had, never mind Paul’s, just drinking with a blunt determination, blunt the pain, the anger…forget about all that fuckin’ stuff…

“John?” Paul said after a minute of stumbling along together; his voice was clear and distinct in the chill air and made John’s head ache.

“Yeah?”

He thought Paul might’ve tensed slightly against him, certainly his shoulders squared.

“What was the problem, before?”

John felt a vicious stirring feeling in his stomach, frothing and seeping into the empty spaces of his mind. He swung his head round to face Paul, could only catch his profile, eyes zooming in on his mouth, soft and supple, though seeming oddly firm at the moment.

“Didn’t have a bloody problem, son,” he said mulishly. Paul seemed to stiffen a little more under his arm, his eye gave a blink, John so caught up in watching those ridiculously long lashes flutter that he scarcely realized it when Paul turned to face him slightly, brow furrowed again, and it irritated John that Paul didn’t know anything about how…how…

But that…he never knew, never really knew leastways…

“That fella thought he’d made you tonight,” John said abruptly, surprising himself, but now that it was out he didn’t want to stop. “Thought he’d have you.”

Paul stared at him in confusion, and somehow John’s view of his face seemed to solidify, as if he’d been looking at Paul through a rainy window earlier. “John, what…”

“Monty,” John said, allowing his voice to slip and slur around the name in some grotesque, flowery affectation. “He wanted to bugger you blind.”

He was stunned to hear a snort—Paul was laughing—

“I don’t think—” Paul began, chortling—

Anger, delayed, kicked up in his gut. “Yeah, that’s a fuckin’ laugh,” John snarled, cutting him off. “He thought he was going to fuck you, Paul.”

_And I…and I—I didn’t…_

Paul made an effort to calm himself, frowning at him. “We were just talkin’ about poetry, John. Honestly, there wasn’t—he didn’t—”

“Oh yes he did,” John persisted vehemently.

There was a pause, and then Paul sighed in annoyance, as if deciding to indulge John, and John hated the sound of it, of Paul patronizing him.

“Even if he _had_ been, I can bloody well take care of myself, John,” Paul said, some color rising in his cheeks now. “I don’t see why you…”

John felt winded—Paul was warm against his side, yet he seemed to be withdrawing from him, seemed cold and distant and remote, as hard and glittering as the stars—

“I know that, but I still—” He struggled to find words, to find some claim over Paul where he had none—

“God, John, it’s not like—” Paul began impatiently, but then suddenly he broke off, slipping out from under John’s arm, steadying him briefly before moving away. “Think that’s a cab comin’ up the street. Hang on—”

John swayed, squinting over at Paul, who was off flagging down the cab now, ghostly in the dark. What the hell was he doing over there? This wasn’t finished—they weren’t—

“They’re all like that,” John said after him, viciously, raising his voice as though Paul was far away. “And you just fuckin’ let them—s’pose you like it, anything for some attention, that’s the way it is with you, Paul—”

And then Paul visibly flinched, and was facing him, and John could tell he was white with some emotion he couldn’t name—anger?—even if he couldn’t tell if he was looking at him, waited for some kind of retort, blow—something…

_Anything—_

But then the cab rolled up to a stop beside them, and Paul was guiding John into the vehicle, muttering something about Weybridge being further and walking to Jane’s, and then the door was slamming and he was away, and Paul was away from him.

Nothing.

 

 

John looked down at his paper and sighed.

He’d forgotten that hangovers were murder for writing. Funny, really, how little time it took to forget something like that—it wasn’t that he never got drunk anymore, even, just that pot had taken over as his drug of choice.

He’d been up in the music room all afternoon, had dragged himself from bed to here, had a joint and then settled down to write. It wasn’t that he’d been short on material lately, either, far from it—“Norwegian Wood,” “Nowhere Man”—damn good stuff.

Maybe desperation would’ve been better at the moment, though, add a bit of an edge to the proceedings, keep John from spending two hours doodling deformed little figures and drinking that second glass of scotch.

John glowered at his paper and viciously scribbled out a drawing that looked remarkably like Paul, then thought better of it and just balled the whole thing up, his throw falling short of the bin.

Still, it was pissing him off a bit, that he couldn’t come up with something halfway decent, couldn’t even come up with a topic worth considering—he’d started in on a few of the better ones earlier on, hoping things would improve when he got going, but when that came up as rot he had found far more satisfaction in violently ripping them up and lobbing them into the rubbish bin than he had in the writing.

John Lennon didn’t write fucking rot, he didn’t write stupid fucking love songs, better to leave that to perfect, pretty Paulie.

Paul.

Christ, maybe he’d just skive off the recording session later, since it seemed beyond him to bang something off at the moment—the logic of it didn’t add up, as they had enough material to last them a week at least, but then, if he couldn’t do this now, it could ruin his playing later, fucking with his head. But then he thought of Paul’s reproachful looks, those big doe eyes mooning at him, and swore under his breath.

“John, love?”

John nearly jumped out of his skin at the sound of a voice behind him, but it was only Cyn, bearing a tray of tea and a few biscuits, looking a right old housewife.

“You must’ve missed me knocking, so I just…” she trailed off timidly, and if John had been in a better mood he might’ve had the good grace to feel awkward that his fucking wife needed permission to enter his space, but he wasn’t, and so he didn’t. Didn’t feel much of anything at all for her, these days.

“Come in, then,” he said through gritted teeth, when he realized belatedly she was waiting for some kind of invitation.

She smiled meekly at him, stepping over the bits of paper strewn across the floor to set the tray down in front of him.

“Might’ve brought something a bit stronger, like,” John sneered, taking a cursory sip of tea in the hope she’d stop fucking hovering over him like that.

She clucked disapprovingly, savoring strongly of Aunt Mimi; he wondered bitterly when Cyn had lost her sense of humor, become a proper wife.

“Which reminds me,” Cyn said, “Paul rang this morning, to make sure you’d gotten home all right.”

Come to that, when had Paul become the wife? But then, he had always been like that, John thought sourly, playing the mother hen, fussing about, straightening his ties, keeping up appearances, making sure John didn’t go too far, forget himself—

“John, are you listening?” Cyn interrupted, the vaguest hint of hurt in her voice where there should have been indignation.

“Just thinking about the song I was in the middle of when you came in,” John lied brutally, watched her face fall as she made her excuses and fled. He knew only too well where to get at her, how to get her to fuck off—knew, too, that it was far too easy for him…

Between Cyn and Paul—fucking hell, _Paul—_

John lit a cigarette and then wished to Christ he had another joint at the ready. He made do with holding the smoke in his lungs and then exhaling slowly, feeling the burn in his throat. He’d tried not to think of Paul today, but that was like telling himself not to fucking breathe at the moment—he’d sit there, concentrating on not doing it, but the minute he lapsed from that he’d subconsciously drag it all up again.

He didn’t remember last night too well, too much of a drunken blur, but he knew enough of what had happened, could see that fucker—Martin or some such other queer name—with his hand on Paul’s knee, Paul laughing, stewing and drinking in the club—walking outside for a bit—then—

John took another quick drag and then ground his ciggie out violently because he needed to vent, thought throwing around a chair or tipping over his desk more than he should allow himself, somehow. Waste of a fucking ciggie; he dropped it into Cyn’s tea.

He scrubbed at his eyes with an ink-stained hand, trying to erase the vague image of Paul, standing there in the dark, on the verge of doing something—saying something?

Fuck.

Shouldn’t have brought it up. Well, he hadn’t brought it up, hadn’t meant to, but somehow it came up and they both knew it, both knew what had come up between them, huge and monstrous and terrifying…

_And you just fuckin’ let them—s’pose you like it, anything for some attention, that’s the way it is with you, Paul—_

John ground his knuckles down, hard, till Paul dissolved into a field of angry red dots.

_But you don’t give a fuck for it in the end, do you, when it’s come down to it._

John opened his eyes, color specks still dancing in vision; he fumbled for another cigarette and lit it clamped tightly between his teeth, burning his thumb as the tiny flame flared briefly and then died. He relished the pain, some miniscule distraction from the thoughts circling round his head like vultures, memories from three years ago searing his brain as though they’d happened the other day.

_Watching Paul dancing with one pretty girl after another, finding himself wishing Paul was still with Dot—less of a threat, somehow, even though they’d been together for three fucking years—sitting in a corner, getting pissed, bullying George when he came up to him for a chat—and then Paul coming back to him, weirdly solemn, quiet, not his usual happy drunk—getting their coats and walking out of the pub, Paul still with him, miraculously, considering—_

It was pathetic he could still remember that, beyond pathetic that he could still care, when that wasn’t even a part of it, or at least not the main part, not even close.

Christ.

It was all a part of it, there was no fucking explanation for it but John knew that was just how it was, in the end.

Wasn’t it?

Jesus bloody buggering fucking Christ.

And then there was more, swelling up against his will, till there was no other thought, no other space left in his whole being—

 _Uncertainty over what had just happened, he couldn’t control himself, time slipped and sped, one minute they were stepping inside and the next reality had narrowed down to just him and Paul, narrowed down to Paul, really, as he struggled with his own belt buckle, to feel naked skin against his own, finally, pushing Paul down on the bed, couldn’t fucking breath, couldn’t think, could only feel and_ want— __

_“John,” a gasp,_

_“Let me fuck you, I need to fuck you, Paul, please, fuck, need—”_

_“John, I—I can’t—”_

_“Have to fuck you, be inside of you, please—”_

_A long moment, an eternity, then a nod, so slight he almost missed it, a sweet, glorious nod, a look in Paul’s eyes he couldn’t understand, and then he couldn’t see Paul’s face anymore, pushing himself against Paul’s back, naked back, against his arse, and then there was a minute as he thrust himself blindly forward, inward, thought he heard Paul cry out, but was too far gone, was lost in oblivion, tighter and hotter than anything, lost in Paul, and it was too much, too fucking_ much too soon—

For a minute John thought he was going to wretch, thought it might be some physical manifestation of his humiliation, his horror at the images he had tried so hard to forget for so long, three fucking years of avoidance, of alcoholic reminiscence and then having to dig himself out of that hole again.

Three fucking years of never knowing where he stood with Paul anymore.

It hadn’t been like this, before—he’d known Paul was his, then, there’d been no doubt, even when there hadn’t been anything sexual between them, which was reaching farther back than John cared to admit; if he was honest, for his part, at least, there had always been something, it had just taken Hamburg to bring it out in the light. And to some extent, there had always been the idea of something further, some more complete form of intimacy, a desire dark and elusive and half-formed in his mind.

It had taken the whole of their known world coming apart for that to come out in the light, but not in the way John had hoped, but instead as some twisted, hideous thing, an unspoken presence that was always between them.

He lifted his cigarette to his lips shakily, took a long drag.

He wished to fucking Christ, to fucking God almighty, that he could somehow take back what had happened, take back waking up alone, Paul gone without a trace, save the tiny bloodstain on his sheets, take back the sick wave of humiliation when he saw him next, the hesitation he felt himself, bitterly accredited to Paul, whenever he wanted to kiss him, hold him, now that everything had changed.

Wished he could take back the consuming desire to experience that feeling again, to experience _Paul_ again, because it was too much, he wanted it too badly, more than anything, and once he’d had it, he’d fucked it up and now he’d lost it (him) forever.

 

 

_“Things are all changin' now,” Paul said quite suddenly, though not unexpectedly—sometimes he’d have a turn like that when he was drunk, all glum and philosophical._

_“Called the progression of time, son,” John replied brusquely, less inclined to get into it, on the way back to his (his and Cyn’s, though she was off visiting with relatives, anyway) flat to finish up a night of drinking at bloody one o’clock in the morning._

_There was a brief silence between them and John knew immediately that Paul hadn’t let it go, was just pondering how to carry on. He sighed, waiting, and sure enough—_

_“No, but…nothing’s the same, y’know,” Paul said slowly, and John could feel Paul searching him out in the darkness, seeking some kind of confirmation before continuing. “I mean, Brian, then a recording contract and it’s goodbye Hamburg in a few months—”_

_“Well, you’re still a soft git, leastways,” John said, casting a sidelong glance at Paul, surprised to find him standing there, still, looking at him earnestly. Got the first sense of foreboding about where this might be going, the first real instinct to kill it before it got too far, but too late—_

_“Then there’s you and Cyn—”_

_“There’s always been me and Cyn,” John interrupted sharply._

_“Getting married, with a kid comin’, is what I meant,” Paul persisted. Stopped now in front of a dingy alley and buildings that looked as though they’d been condemned for about fifty years, far from the filtering street lamps, John felt the moment expand between them, felt real terror as he flailed to get a grip on it._

_“Some things are still the fuckin’ same,” he bit out._

_“And then there’s us,” Paul finished quietly, heedlessly, voice just a little too firm, and John just knew he’d been planning out what to say, hated him for it, felt fury explode within him, but at the same time, knowing that gave him back some inkling of control, some perverse hope, at least enough to keep the ground from opening up underneath him._

_“Is that really what you think?” he demanded, voice too loud and aggressive, beyond his restraint, a match for the glower he could feel settling onto his face._

_“John, you know the same as me that it can’t—we can’t, not now, with everything…” Paul said, and it was agony for John as he strained unnaturally to hear the words trip out, agony to comprehend. Paul took a deep breath, finishing, “You know.”_

You know.

_The words hit him like a blow to his gut, like someone had whaled on him with a fucking chair. He took a step closer, got right in Paul’s face, Paul who didn’t move, all aggression above his staggering soul._

_“Is that really what you fuckin’ think, Paul?”_

_“You_ know _, John,” Paul said again, as if that was enough—enough for the pain ripping at John’s chest, the wild, savage, unnamable emotion coursing through him, enough for everything that had happened between them, everything John had felt and heard and seen and done—everything they both had done—_

_And then, before he knew what he was doing, he was pushing Paul into the alleyway, had shoved him in against one of the buildings, too hard, not hard enough, and there was a short scuffle before John won out and leaned in, sealing his lips over Paul’s brutally._

_John kissed Paul ferociously, barely cognizant of Paul’s strangled noise of protest or his attempts to jerk free, not letting him get away, roughening their contact, biting down cruelly on his bottom lip. Paul let out a small cry, struggles intensifying, turning his face to the side and breathing out in sharp gasps._

_“John, can’t—” he muttered unintelligibly, but John’s eyes were drawn greedily to his bruised, swollen mouth, shiny with spit._

_“Shut up, Paul,” he muttered coarsely, kissing him again harshly. He forced his tongue into Paul’s mouth lewdly, hungrily, obscenely, finesse the last thing on his mind as Paul’s eyes fluttered closed, and he felt him more than heard him gasp as he pushed into him roughly so there wasn’t an inch of space between their bodies, unable to stop himself. His mind was whirling from too much drink and too little oxygen and the feel of Paul so close against him; he was too hard already, too highly strung and desperate and out of his head, and when he finally broke apart from Paul it was only to lean their foreheads together, lips just grazing, staring fanatically into Paul’s eyes as they opened slowly to meet his. “You can’t—I won’t let—”_

_“John…” Paul groaned, and was that a rasp of surrender in his voice?_

_“Nothing’s changed,” John said lowly, fiercely. His voice sounded guttural to his own ears, gravelly and oddly foreign—he scarcely knew his own desperation, could feel it picking him up and hurtling him forward into something vast and endless and alien._

 

There came a time when it was time to go to Paul with a song. It was one of those unsaid things in life that one never knew with exact certainty when it would happen, just that it would and you would know it when the time came along.

John had nothing to show for himself, hadn’t written a thing for days, but he had managed to scrounge up some unfinished bit of song. He remembered it quite well when he found it (it had been in the back of his mind for months), as he’d been taken with the concept as the makings of genius when he’d started in with it—a sort of look back on his life. He’d gotten the idea off of a journalist’s suggestion, had worked on it feverishly for a time, and then had realized it was all crap, a grocery list of things from his childhood:

“And then I rode the bus, and then I hung about Strawberry Fields, and then I went to school, and then me mum got run down by a car—”

That sort of thing, really.

So John thought he might as well sacrifice the fucking thing to the great god Paul, just so he had something with him—walking in there with nothing, given the state of things, was not an option.

John wasn’t quite sure what the state of things was, wasn’t even sure if Paul was acting funny; he felt too fucking awkward himself to be a fair judge, was never a fair judge when it came to Paul, anyway. Whenever he got close to him now, since that night last week, he started to watch for some sign that Paul was shy of him, agonized over every infinitesimal movement he made, felt bitterly that he was moving away, knew it was madness but couldn’t fuckin’ control it, could he?

There was a distant knock on the door; John had made sure he was safely closeted away in his music room in time for Paul to call, to save himself the trouble of all that hello rot (to give himself time to prepare for seeing Paul again). He could just hear Cyn hesitate a beat, no doubt waiting for him to come charging down the stairs to take it off her hands (or maybe she was busy wiping her hands on the old apron), before she went to do it herself.

And then he heard Paul’s voice, and he half expected to hear Aunt Mimi shouting up the stairs, “Your little friend’s here again, John!”

His mouth twisted. It had been a long time since he hadn’t been there to greet Paul, really, was always fucking waiting on him to show up to sessions like some pathetic dog slobbering all over, waiting for its supper, especially here in Kenwood, where it was deader than…dead. Just him and Cyn and whatever was left between them—the son, mostly.

And as if on cue, there was Julian’s rapturous shout, “Uncle Paul!” and the sound of little feet pounding down the hallway, then some indistinct murmur as Paul no doubt cooed and fussed over the kid like some green old maiden aunt dropping by. Christ…

But there was Paul, galumphing up the stairs, and then suddenly he was in the music room and he’d said hello (John had managed a grunt in response) and he’d taken a seat next to John and John had cursed himself at the knot forming in his chest at their nearness, and then Paul was looking at him expectantly, waiting.

And then suddenly he didn’t feel like sharing, didn’t matter that it was a piece of shit he didn’t care about (still cared about). He wondered what the world was coming to, if he didn’t have the stones to give the Mccartney half a look anymore, but then Paul’s opinion had always mattered more to him than the critics and fuck all—if he liked it, then sod the rest, was the way it went.

“What’ve you got then, son?” he asked Paul, hoped to Christ he had something worth going over.

Paul looked mildly surprised, peering over at him (John always went first, in recording, yes, but in their writing sessions, too), but didn’t pass comment. John gritted his teeth. Then Paul had handed over his bit, some harmless lines scrawled out about calls not being returned (apparently he and Jane were going through a rough spot); he slid it back over to Paul silently, feeling slightly nauseous at the thought of him in a relationship with anyone, didn’t know why it was getting to him so much at the moment (it always got to him).

“What’d you think?” Paul prodded after a moment, looking none too concerned with a ciggie dangling from his mouth, probably thinking anything inspired by the lovely Miss Asher was worth publishing. “I’ve a rough demo at home, but I didn’t think to, y’know…”

He gestured vaguely, cigarette in hand now, oblivious to the jolt that went through John as he heard Paul call the Wimpole Street house— _Jane’s_ house—home.

John shrugged. “Not much to say, really,” he said, giving off a good impression of carelessness, then let his lip curl. “Jane causing problems, then?”

“Eh,” Paul said noncommittally, clearly not keen to discuss it.

John sneered. “You’ll want to get your woman in order, Paulie.”

Paul blew smoke in his face before tapping some ash into the tray, giving him a bland little smile, the kind where John could never tell if he was genuinely amused. “Like you’ve done for Cyn, I s’pose.”

It was still impossible to gauge Paul’s exact tack, but to John it didn’t amount to much of anything, either way. He drew a cigarette out of his pack and clenched it between his lips as he rooted around for his bleeding matchbook, which seemed to have sprouted legs and run off. John could feel eyes on him, heard him let out a proprietary sigh and then all of the sudden he was face to face with Paul, who had bent in towards him, lighting it himself wordlessly before returning to his seat. John gripped the edge of his desk tightly, reflexively (pathetically) at the brief proximity before forcing himself to relax.

“Your turn, Lennon,” Paul said after a minute, nodding at him through the thin waft of smoke.

John felt his stomach do a sick turn, didn’t know why he was being such a bloody poof about it, but he handed the scrap of lyric over, gritting his teeth when their fingers met midway.

Paul grinned at him, though it seemed slightly strained, as if he were aware John was in one of his sulks, which only served to make things worse, of course.

“What’s this, then?”

John watched him beadily as he bowed his head to the paper, the graceful curve of his neck drawing his eyes, before he realized what he was doing and looked away. “Just some rubbish, y’know,” he said, managing to sound indifferent.

“Huh,” Paul murmured absently, mind on his reading now.

John sat and smoked, scowling at the floor and then at the wall, starting to get impatient—how long did it take someone to read a dozen bloody lines? But Paul wasn’t reading, strictly, not anymore; he’d let up and was mulling it over, having another take at it while John awaited the verdict. It drove him mad on a good day, and this was not a good fucking day, wasn’t a good fucking week, come to that.

“Christ, are you done yet?” John snapped finally.

Paul looked up at him reluctantly, hummed in affirmation.

“Well?”

Paul blinked at him, a silent reproach for his impatience.

“Well…” he said slowly, glancing down at the paper again, “Good concept, really—is this the thing you were tellin' me about…?”

“What?” he pressed testily as Paul trailed off vaguely, knowing the answer would be more or less irrelevant.

“The Allsop thing, y’know,” Paul replied. “About your life and all.”

John gazed at him stonily, eyes narrowing—it was pretty bleeding obvious that it was, wasn’t it? Then with an overwhelming flash of humiliation he recalled how he’d let on his excitement about it to Paul, thought of what a piece of shit it was right now.

“Look, Paul, just tell me what you think about it, aye?” he said edgily.

“Well, like I said, the concept’s good…” Paul began—

“Is that all?” John cut in sharply.

Paul hesitated for a moment, and then John knew that Paul had been stalling, hadn’t had the guts to say what he thought outright, tried not to think about what that meant he’d thought; he felt his wrath rise within him dangerously, didn’t take much these days.

“This isn’t criticism, John,” Paul said in a rush, before slowing down to choose his words carefully, “But this—” he waved the song a bit—“This isn’t you, it’s just a…”

“’What I Did On My Holidays Bus’ song, I know,” John said quickly, voice sounding oddly flat and dispassionate, disconnected from him. Paul shot him a fleeting, discerning look, as if trying to ascertain his mood before continuing.

“Well, yeah,” he assented at length. He paused, then cast another glance in his direction, furtively almost. “If you’re goin' to write about your life, you’ve got to put more of…yourself into it.”

“What insight,” John sneered, not sure why he was taking this so badly. “You’ve really got me on that one, Paul.”

Paul seemed to visibly repress the urge to retort, a strange twitch crossing his smooth features.

“Do you want my help or not?” he asked quietly. John made no answer except to take a measured drag of his ciggie, knew that he’d gotten to Paul somehow and was darkly, morbidly fascinated.

Paul was regarding him warily now, uncrossing his legs and then fiddling with his sleeve unconsciously before seeming to steel himself.

“It’s like, here’s the song—” Paul held his thumb and index finger slightly apart “—and here’s _you_ , right,” he spread his hands widely—“It’s not you, see. You’re not Penny Lane and the bus or any of that stuff—”

John fought back the derision that shot up in him with difficulty as Paul struggled for words to explain himself, to explain him.

“What I mean is, it’s got to be less about what you’ve done and been and such, more about you, yeah?” Paul bit his lip nervously, unconsciously, black eyes unfathomable, oddly removed now. “More from the heart, like.”

And that hit John like a ton of bricks, tore him up inside with a sudden, violent fury, that Paul of all people could say that, after everything—Paul, who never—to him—

“That’s rich, coming from you,” he said lowly.

Paul’s eyes widened for an instant, of course, _innocent_ fucking _Paul_ , he couldn’t fucking stand this—

“You never just come out and say anything, Paul,” he spat, barely giving it a second, “Songs or otherwise.”

“Go on,” Paul sneered, expression shuttering carefully.

“It’s the fuckin’ truth!” John snarled, voice rising, forgetting himself. “You’re too busy smarming up the whole bleeding world, so it’s fucking Paul McCharmly this and that, but you never say a fucking thing, do you? You’re just an evasive little cunt. ”

There was a moment where they both knew that John had gone too far and the tension of it crackled between them. Paul opened his mouth roughly, then closed it again, biting down viciously on the inside of his cheek from the looks of it. “Look, do you want me fuckin’ opinion or not?”

John felt a strange stab of resentment at Paul’s self-control (case in point), didn’t quite know if he’d been looking to have it out, felt like his own mind was distanced and opaque, clouded from the anger thrumming through his system as he stared furiously into those eyes.

“No, thanks,” he said coldly, at last. “Just a little shit song I wrote.”

There was a long strained pause, as they stared at each other and Paul’s eyes flashed suddenly, dangerously.

“You’re not so direct as you fuckin’ think, John,” he said in a low voice. “You don’t always—”

And there was an unexpected, raw strand of bitterness in his voice that caught John off guard for a minute, but then his anger was back at full force, scarcely allowing him to comprehend the implications of it, roaring up past whatever slight waver he’d felt—

“Don’t always what, Macca,” he retorted, “don’t always spell every little fucking thing out for you?”

John was vaguely aware as Paul’s face drained of color and his features tightened from some bit back emotion, felt brutal pleasure that he’d hurt him, but couldn’t register the extent of it. Then his senses honed in and a buzzing filled his head as Paul got to his feet as though to leave, saying jerkily, “Right, I’m not doing this now.”

“Where the fuck d’you think you’re goin’?”

There was barely a breath between Paul’s pronouncement and his voice, rising savage and demanding, and then in an instant he was standing up as well.

“I’ve had enough of your fuckin’ shit, John,” Paul spat, moving towards the door as John went after him closely. “I don’t even know why I—”

“Oh no you fucking don’t—” John growled, taking hold of Paul, hardly cognizant of what he was doing, of Paul’s strangled yelp of pain as his fingers, ruthless, viselike, dug into his flesh— “Not until you—”

His body was throbbing with an inhuman rage that defied circumstance and reason; Paul was struggling viciously against him and then they were scuffling like a couple of teenagers; Paul took a clumsy swing at him that connected somewhere on his face; John felt a dull flush of pain as he grabbed Paul’s wrist, forced it grimly between them, an odd, hysterical laugh bubbling up through his anger—

“Fuck off!” Paul burst out, voice raw and animal, wrenching his bruised arm in a vain attempt to free himself. The sound of it ripped through John, a violent, furious thrill to hear him so out of control, and before he knew what he was doing he was leaning down and smashing his lips into Paul’s, hard and closed-mouthed as he breathed raggedly through his nose.

Paul stiffened at the contact before he jerked away, jerked free, and John barely had time to react before a fist collided with his cheek, was sent staggering backwards.

Paul stood there breathing deeply for a second, the look in his eyes like that of a wounded animal as he stared at John, but then he turned unsteadily and was gone.

Leaving John alone in the Kenwood music room trying to figure out what the fuck had just happened between them.

 

 

John staggered into the house, the dark and the emptiness and the silence only serving to irritate his temper—he didn’t want fucking quiet right now, didn’t want to be left to himself long enough to think—then there was an almighty crash as he knocked over the umbrella stand next to the door. Swearing under his breath, he stepped over the bloody thing and continued on his way to the kitchen. And the kitchen hurt his eyes, hurt his fucking brain; it was too white and scrubbed and surgical where he wanted filth and shadows and broken things, something to match the monstrous thing that had been building inside him since the afternoon. Since Paul—

“Fucking Christ,” John muttered, then wondered why he was bothering to keep his voice down. It was his fucking house—what was it to him if Cyn had a bad time of sleeping? He was the man; he brought home all the fucking money…so she could buy fucking umbrella stands…

“Fuck!” he cursed, more vehemently this time, finding some primal sort of relief in doing so. “Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck…”

He banged open cabinets until he came upon the liquor, bit amazing that he had enough shit in his system that he hadn’t been able to remember where the booze was kept, considering that was the only reason he’d ever come into this room. That, and the fucking glasses, which he needed to drink the booze…

Where the fuck were the fucking glasses?

He might’ve said it aloud, wasn’t sure, wasn’t really sure what was in his head and what was coming out. There wasn’t a fucking thing in his head, at that _(PAUL PAUL PAUL)_ , or at least there shouldn’t have been a fucking thing—didn’t want there to be a fucking thing—PAUL PAUL PAUL PAUL—

Blindly he lunged for the next cabinet, then the next, and then finally the glasses were right there, and he’d snagged one, knocking another one down in the process; it fell to the floor, shattering into a thousand pieces as John watched, an odd spike of satisfaction flaring up inside him, there and gone in the next moment.

Without thinking he swept his arm along the shelf, and then suddenly the house was rent with the piercing sound of breaking glass, so that John couldn’t hear his own brain anymore—

“John, _what on earth—_?” came Cyn’s voice from the doorway, sudden and intrusive, and John felt a resentment towards her he could scarcely credit as he swung around to look at her, hair loose and tousled from sleep, clad in a bathrobe and nighty.

_Leading the bird into the bathroom, all shrill giggling and blond hair and huge knockers, just what he needed, grasping to get him closer as he rammed into her, forcing himself to keep his eyes open, to look at her—_

“John—what—the glasses—” she stammered helplessly, staring at him as though she’d caught him in some flight of insanity.

_The girl reaching up to kiss him, falling into it, eyes sliding shut and giving himself up to the illusion for an instant—_

“Don’t know what the fuck you’re doin’ here,” John slurred brutishly, fighting back the images of the girl he’d fucked earlier, fighting back the urge to vomit.

“Where have you been? It’s gone past five,” Cynthia asked him, a little uncertainly, as if she had an idea and didn’t want to know.

Of course she didn’t want to know. John sneered. She never did—never wanted to know the real John Lennon, just the hard, clever art student and then the young husband, the John you could read about in the fucking fan rags…

“What’s it to you,” he muttered thickly.

“What…?” she repeated feebly. John felt some of his anger surge to the surface.

“I said, what’s it to you, you daft cow!” he said viciously, voice jarringly loud, shards crunching under foot as he lurched forward, bottle in hand. Cyn flinched as he made to speak again, his face twisting up into some grotesque grimace of contempt. “Now run along back to bed.”

“John, lower your voice, please,” Cyn implored him, but too late—there came a wail from upstairs, followed by successively louder cries. She breathed out a suppressed, exhausted sigh, and John perceived that only now was she moved to feel cross with him. “Now you’ve done it. You’ve woken Julian…”

There was a minute as they gazed at each other, his wife’s haggard face caught in dim relief from the light filtered through the window. She didn’t look like the girl he’d dated in that instant, didn’t look like anyone John could recognize. When…?

Then the moment was shattered by the boy’s screams.

“Well?” John prompted, as dispassionately as he could.

“Oh, all right,” Cynthia fairly snapped, and then she had turned away and all John could hear was her slippered ascent up the stairs in tandem with the sniveling shrieks of his son, until everything was quiet again.

He’d wanted quiet when Cyn was there, but now that there was nary a whisper of her and Julian and silence reigned he felt more alone than he’d ever felt in his life, down to just him and the incomprehensible pain that filled him.

John staggered out of the kitchen, made his way up to the music room as quietly as he could, breathing labored as he stopped alternately to throw back whiskey, straight from the bottle—he had no idea how much he’d drunk over the course of the night, plus the joints and the pills God knows what else he had put into his system, but that didn’t fucking matter at the moment—the more the merrier, so they said…

Besides, it wasn’t enough yet, wouldn’t be enough until he had no memory left, no memory of the afternoon or the last fucking week, fuck, his whole life—whatever it took to get rid of _Paul_ , just for one fucking second, even—

Paul.

John hacked as the whiskey burned liquid fire down his throat, wiped his mouth roughly with the back of his hand, practically falling into the music room as he reached it at long last. He had a sudden, visceral reaction to being there, again—

_—eyes dark and liquid, naked pain and bitterness and something John couldn’t recognize—_

“Fuck,” John muttered.

He stepped forward blindly in the dark, searching for a chair, his desk, anything; his knee collided painfully with something and he stumbled forward, catching himself with one hand on the wall. He stood there against the wall for some time, something solid in the absence of light, until it got to be that the drugs kicked in and he became frightened of venturing forth again. He slid down along it jerkily, alcohol sloshing in the bottle, already too low to spill out the top.

Paul.

John lifted a hand to his face and pressed down hard on the ugly bruise that had bloomed high on his cheek, letting out a hoarse grunt of pain. Wondered why it was so easy to react to physical pain, so hard to voice the pain living inside him, breathing as he breathed, clawing at him, ripping him apart—

The pain that ruled his work, his fucking mind, his head, his whole fucking life—why did it have to be so hard to—why did it have to—

But Paul didn’t feel a fucking bit of it, John thought suddenly, savagely. He didn’t understand a fucking thing, didn’t understand John—he didn’t—didn’t—

_—coming back to himself, face pressed into the back of Paul’s neck, breathing harsh, sure it’d never get back to normal, nothing would ever get back to normal, had never experienced something so good, so fucking right in the world, slipping into mindlessness, sleepy oblivion when he realized the tension in Paul’s back, the silence, then felt Paul pulling away from him—_

An agonized howl rose up in John’s chest, coming out strangled and harsh and inhuman as he fought futilely to keep it in, to hold back. His throat burned raw as he pressed his hands roughly to his face, hot, angry, desperate tears pricking his eyes.

There were no fucking words for this, could be no fucking words, never could—

_“You’re not so direct as you fuckin’ think, John. You don’t always—”_

Don’t always fucking what?

Unbidden he recalled the bitterness in Paul’s voice, the wild hurt in his eyes—

_Waking up cold and alone, alone with his humiliation and his hurt and his regret. Alone._

Don’t always what, Paul?

 

 

John woke up the next morning (just a few hours later, actually) still hunched miserably against the wall, feeling as though someone had taken a drill to his skull. It took a cup of burnt coffee, a handful of pills and a missed shard of glass to the foot before he felt remotely human again (that was the only sign of Cyn or last night he’d encountered save the bottle of whiskey), and even then he wasn’t sure why he had trudged upstairs and returned to the music room again. Or why he was staring down at the scrap about his life, the one that he’d shown Paul, the idea he’d never really let go.

He felt clammy and nauseous, yet his mind seemed clearer, more sober than it had been in years, his anger mellowed out for the moment, at least, into a bitter, melancholic sense of reality. And reality was not good, things couldn’t—he couldn’t—go on like this forever, couldn’t spend the rest of his life tiptoeing around (or rather raging around) the situation. Paul. Whatever was between them, what had gotten between them.

At the same time though, he didn’t know how to make himself fucking stop, _couldn’t_ make himself stop. As long as there was Paul, there would be this _thing_ within him, pushing him, sending him mad—had been that way for as long as he could remember, since those days in Liverpool where they had started feeling each other out, where John had discovered Paul, the real Paul, had latched on to him in feverish ecstasy, like drug he couldn’t fucking live without.

Because he couldn’t live without Paul, not now, not after—

John’s eyes bored into his own words unseeingly, faced with the stinging admission that Paul was right about them. The song was a farce; it wasn’t about him, about John Lennon, was just some rubbish he could pick out of his memories—there was not a fucking bit of him in there, living in those words—

How could he have thought it possible to write a song about his life without—? John bit down on his lip, hard enough to taste blood, as he tried in vain to censor himself—

_Without Paul._

Honesty came freely to John now that it had started, less painful than he had expected, perhaps—

Because Paul was the most important thing in his whole fucking life, seemed sick to say so, considering Cynthia and Julian, but it was the truth—he was everything to John, nothing had changed since things had broken down between them, he wasn’t sure if it could, for him—because—because—

Because he loved Paul, was in love with Paul, loved him more than anything.

_In my life I love you more._

John exhaled sharply as the words came to him, but he knew with immediate certainty that they were right, had known in the back of his mind all along that this torturous feeling inside him—the pain, the humiliation, the uncertainty—

—the feeling he got when Paul walked into a room, when their eyes met, when he touched him—

Even _then_ —

It had been love. It had been love.

John felt that he was suspended in the moment, naked and bereft and alone.

Because he couldn’t, not with the way things were—

Could he?

There was a long, tense moment as John sat intent, considering, before he picked up his pen and began to write.

 

 

“That should do it, I reckon,” George said finally, round six o’clock. “Right, George?”

“Quite,” George Martin (or Henry, as John liked to call him) said austerely, allowing himself a thin smile at the other George.

“Well then,” the other George replied, looking tired, a little bit frustrated still but willing to go with it. “Should do it for the day too, I guess.”

They’d started off the morning with “Day Tripper”, a ripper of John’s, but the song they’d just finished up with was one of George’s. A rare enough event, to be sure, but made even more rare by the fact that John didn’t go through the whole thing messing about with Paul; there remained, however, that underlying lack of the same enthusiasm from Lennon/McCartney that George had endured since he his fledgling songwriting career first took wing.

John couldn’t be arsed about George’s song at the moment, if he was being honest, hadn’t given too much of a fuck playing through it take after take, except when the time got on and he was still bloody doing it. Wasn’t a bad tune, either, fashioned in Byrds-esque style and everything—but then John wouldn’t have given a fuck had it been Beethoven’s bloody ninth.

Had too much on his mind. Well, one thing on his mind, but that was fucking everything.

“Paul,” he said, steeling himself. Paul didn’t seem to hear him from where he was crouched, shutting his bass away in its case with clinical precision. John cleared his throat, which was suddenly dry and rough as sandpaper. “Paul.”

“Eh?” Paul said in surprise, looking up to see John looming over him.

“I’ve got something,” John said.

“What—” Paul began, frowning in puzzlement as he stood up, but then comprehension dawned on him. “A song.”

“I thought you might take a look at it,” John said.

“’Course,” Paul said, a little too breezily. He regarded John uncertainly. “When d’you—?”

“Now,” John said bluntly, then rushed to equivocate, “If you’re free, I mean.”

“Only it’ll have to be your place,” Paul said. “Jane’s mum’s got a lesson round about now.”

“That’s what I was thinking, anyroad,” John said, suppressing a guilty twinge as he went on, “Cyn and Julian are off visiting with her parents for a bit.”

Paul seemed to think it over, no doubt checking over his precious social calendar to make sure he wouldn’t be standing up fashionable London for this. John scowled. He was vaguely aware that in the background the Georges were having a final chat and Ringo was pulling on his coat, but reality had whittled down to just him and Paul. Again.

“All right, then,” Paul said at length, voice firm but devoid of expression.

“All right,” John said.

 

 

“Well, give us a look, then,” Paul said.

They were sitting together in the Kenwood music room once again, the tableau around which this whole— _thing_ —between them seemed to revolve around. John had the lyric sheet in hand, which was unusually tidy compared to his usual work; he’d copied it over once he was done, hadn’t wanted Paul to see the scribbles and cross outs he’d made.

It was hard enough to show him the finished thing.

At length, half in anticipation, half in dread, he handed over the song, felt as though a part of him was being handed over, something alien and grotesquely unused to light, to be prodded and poked and examined by Paul.

He had to do it, though. Had to show him—things couldn’t go on like this, he couldn’t spend the rest of his life feeling like this—

“What’s this?” Paul asked, curiously giving the paper a cursory glance and then frowning. “Bit tidy for you, isn’t it?”

John made an indistinct noise in his throat. “Just read it, Paul, yeah?”

Paul studied him shrewdly for a moment, then turned his attention to the paper once more. John wondered what he saw.

Silence fell between them as Paul read and John watched him read, and to him it was agony, like those moments of waiting for the axe to fall—the moments when it was too late to take something back, to leave it unsaid and untouched, and you had to face the consequences you couldn’t prepare for, when you were hurtled forward into the terrifying unknown. And that was what caused John such anguish—things, as they were, were driving him fucking mad, and yet—what if—what if—

They could never go back from this.

John took a deep, unsteady breath, eyes straining unnaturally to watch Paul, Paul who sat there reading far beyond the time it could take for someone to read twenty lines, beyond all endurance for John—

“So?” he said finally, the word feeling as though it was dredged up from some deep well within him. And then he realized that Paul wasn’t reading it anymore, that his head was bent towards it in an unmoving stare, and the realization caused a painful and indefinable shift inside him—what did that—did that—?

Paul looked up at him, and John held his gaze, willing some kind of connection, some glimmer of understanding—

“Well done,” Paul said finally, voice oddly repressed, expressionless, and John controlled himself with difficulty as a sickening, falling sensation took hold of him, tried not to assume—but then Paul lifted his chin towards him, “You did it.”

“What’d you think?” John pressed, and it took all the courage he possessed not to assume, not to fall back onto the anger dormant inside him, not to run at Paul and shake the truth from him, whatever way it landed.

Paul smiled at him, and it wasn’t the natural smile he was used to—it was different, more conscious, reserved, somehow. “It’s brilliant, John,” he said. “Really. It’s—you did—the song’s fantastic, great. Have you got a melody, or—?”

“That’s not what I meant,” John said; it cost him a great effort to keep his voice steady, measured.

Paul’s eyes widened fractionally and he bit his lip.

“The words, are they—?”

Paul’s face remained a mask as he opened to respond, and suddenly John was tired of skirting around it, knew he would have to be the one to take the risk, to step into the unknown.

“I—they’re for you,” he said in a painful, exhilarating rush, struggling to explain himself where there could be no real explanation, not without—without—John took a quick, deep breath, rubbing at his nose nervously, briefly. “I wrote them, it, about you. The song. It’s for you.”

“John, you don’t have to—” Paul said, lowly, swiftly.

John’s heart clenched painfully at this last temptation to slide back into things as they were.

“No, before—we haven’t—” Paul was watching him intently, and John experienced a moment of doubt, but it was far too late now, come what may. “I _am_ , now.”

It occurred to John that he had never seen Paul, Paul the Cute Beatle, the charmer, affable, irresistible, lovely Paul, so removed from all that, as Paul stared at him, eyes huge and dark and fathomless, a fine tension taking hold of his frame; he had never seemed so far way when so close to John as in that moment, as he waited for things to go one way or the other.

“John,” Paul murmured, tone wondering, almost to himself; John kept himself still, could barely think to breathe, but then it was too much and he reached for Paul, pulling him in towards him gently, fingers sliding through silken, inky hair as he leaned their faces close together, lips meeting, barely touching, watching as Paul’s eyes slid shut, the dark fans of lashes stark against his pale cheeks, as Paul leaned into their embrace, emitting a harsh gasp.

“Paul,” John muttered, allowing his eyes to close as well, giving himself a moment, the first peaceful moment in what felt like an eternity. Paul’s cheek was warm against his, his breath coming in soft, even gusts against his skin. And then a pair of lips found his, sliding against his softly, almost shyly, and John fell into the kiss without a thought in his head, a quiet groan escaping him at the beautiful, iridescent feeling that ascended within him, so entirely apart from his anger and hurt and uncertainty—and then Paul had tilted his head so that suddenly John could have his mouth more completely, and then their tongues had met and it was wet and messy and wonderful and it was never enough, could never be enough—

Paul broke away from him, panting hard against his lips, but John followed him, captured his lips once more before they both fought for air, ragged breath mingling as John stared at Paul’s face, the flush high on his cheekbones, the fullness of his lips.

“Paul,” John said lowly. “Paul, open your eyes, look at me.”

Paul opened his eyes slowly, meeting his gaze at once, and John’s breath caught as their eyes met at the simple, beautiful honesty of their connection.

“Things can’t stay like they’ve been. I’ve been going fuckin’ mad,” John said, unsure how best to continue, if he had to, his heart seeming to swell painfully in his ribcage.

“No,” Paul agreed, voice hoarse. “John, I—”

He stopped abruptly and John watched him, waiting for him to find the words, but they never came because then Paul was kissing him again, firmly, resolutely, almost, fisting his shirt as John responded readily, the expectation for some kind of verbal reply fading as their tongues twined and their eyes closed and their hands started to roam; John moaned into their kiss as Paul’s hand stole into his shirt, grasping his shoulder, touching bare skin; he clutched Paul closer to him, as close as he could with them seated as they were, before he broke off to bury his face in Paul’s neck.

He could smell Paul’s scent, some vague mix of aftershave and fresh clothes and something minty, then cursed his predilection for turtlenecks as he yanked the collar out of the way impatiently, lips finding the soft skin below before he scraped his teeth across the sensitive juncture between shoulder and neck, smirking as Paul half whimpered, half groaned against him, nails digging into his skin.

“God, John,” Paul breathed.

And there was something in Paul’s voice that sent a shudder through him, something dark and needy and starkly sexual. He drew away, ignoring the small, disappointed noise Paul made, then tugged at the hem of his sweater.

“Off,” he muttered thickly when Paul was showing signs of incomprehension, and then Paul had lifted his arms and the offending garment was thrown away, leaving Paul bare to the waist as John pulled him in once again, as close as possible, running his hands along Paul’s back, kissing his neck again before Paul resisted, pulling back to lean his head against John’s shoulder as his hands fumbled with John’s buttons.

“You—you too,” he said roughly, and John felt a jolt of arousal, reached down to help with his buttons, their hands brushing, sending sparks tingling through John’s system. And then Paul was pressing himself against him again, and their bare skin met through his open shirt, and then they were kissing again, lewdly, as John stroked his tongue inside Paul’s mouth deeply, and their hands were everywhere, and fuck it felt so good, so good to be so close to Paul again after so long, to hold him and kiss him and touch him, to see him lose fucking control, hear all those little noises he made when John licked his ear, or bit his neck, say—

And Paul let out a low cry at that, stifled in John’s shirtfront (he could feel his lips, hot and wet, through the cotton), babbling incoherently, “Fuck, John, _please_ …”

John felt something surge within him, half tenderness, half arousal, an inexplicable, wicked smile cracking on his face. “What’s that, love?”

“John, please, I need—”

Paul sobbed as John bit down again, harder this time, hands curling uselessly into the fabric of John’s shirt. Then, when he was dragging his tongue over the area, Paul was suddenly tugging at his arm where it was leant against his shoulder, grabbing at his hand and bringing it in between his legs, to where he wanted it, gasping as their joined hands made contact with his crotch.

John gently freed his hand from Paul’s, and then rubbed it over Paul’s erection, slowly, almost carefully, as Paul shivered delightfully against him. The need to see Paul’s face as he did this was overwhelming.

“Look at me,” he demanded, for the second time that evening, another wave of tenderness washing through him as Paul lifted his head from his shoulder and he hungrily took in the half open mouth, the flushed cheeks, the heavy eyes, half closed and glittering, took in the effect he was having on Paul, the pleasure he was giving him.

Just him and Paul, just the two of them, not another fucking thing in the world right now.

_Johnandpaul._

Spurred on by the thought, John carefully undid Paul’s trousers, reached inside his pants and grasped the bare length of him in his hand. Paul let out a raspy groan, almost a growl, clinging tightly, almost painfully to his shoulders, and then his hand was moving, gently at first and then faster as Paul bucked up into his hand restlessly.

And then suddenly Paul was reaching for him, attacking his belt buckle, and John emitted a loud groan as Paul’s hand found his dick, squeezing and jerking and twisting his wrist, and it was too fast and too much, too soon, it wasn’t enough, wasn’t fast enough, hard enough, wasn’t enough as he stared into Paul’s eyes so close to his—

He imagined being inside him, fucking him, that tight heat enveloping him, Paul enveloping him, Paul’s legs wrapped around his waist as he thrust into him repeatedly—

“Stop,” Paul demanded abruptly, with difficulty, seizing his wrist, jolting him out of his fantasy. “I can’t—I don’t want—”

John stilled his hand, not letting Paul go, even as Paul’s hand slipped to a stop on his own dick.

“Bed,” Paul said. “Can we—?”

John reared up in sheer surprise to hear Paul suggest it, but he didn’t need telling twice; he stood up and hauled Paul up with him when he didn’t seem to be able to move, steadying him when his knees buckled.

“C’mon,” he said, and then he was pulling Paul by the hand, leading him from the room and into the hallway, not caring about their varying states of undress.

Paul gripped his hand and then seemed to pull him back a little so that their bodies bumped together. “Not yours—Cyn—”

“No,” John assured him, dragging him instead to the guest bedroom, suppressing a slightly delirious cackle as he imagined what Cyn’s stuffy old relatives might think if they knew what he’d gotten up to in there. Then Paul was shoving at him impatiently and they had stumbled inside together and then John turned around, closing the distance between them and Paul was kissing him again fiercely. John grinned against his lips, the thought striking him again.

Paul pulled away. “You nutter,” he said, fondly disgusted. John laughed out loud at that as Paul freed himself from his arms, taking a step away. John’s eyes followed him, watched with interest as Paul went a bit red at the scrutiny, to see how far down his blush went, before his throat went dry as Paul stepped out of his trousers, bent to peel off his socks awkwardly, endearingly, standing before him nude as the day he was born, smooth, all soft skin bathed in the half glow of the evening sun.

“Well?” Paul prompted, sitting down on the edge of the bed and scooting back, propping his head up as he laid on his side and waited. For John to join him.

Fuck.

John swallowed hard, unable to tear his gaze away from Paul as he yanked off his shirt and then kicked out of his trousers gracelessly, crawling into bed beside Paul, warmth and lust coursing through him as they just lay there together, looking into each others’ eyes, and in that moment John was struck with the full force his love for Paul, that just laying there with him, naked, could be more erotic to him than being with, fucking, any girl.

He reached out a slightly shaking hand to smooth it over Paul’s hair, caress his cheek, a rush of feeling sweeping through him as Paul made a small noise, tilting his head towards John till their lips brushed in the lightest kiss. John’s breath caught at the contact, and unable to stop himself, he pressed forward to meet him fully, the transient, ethereal beauty of the moment was lost as their passion swelled once more, hands grasping and gripping and stroking all over, breath coming in harsh gasps and moans.

“John,” Paul muttered into their kiss and John broke away to look at him. They stared at each other for a moment before Paul moved onto his back, grasping his shoulder; John understood, settling on top of him, maintaining eye contact as he lowered himself so that there wasn’t an inch of space between them, gasping as he felt Paul’s erection pressed tight against his.

“ _John_ ,” he sobbed again in ecstasy. A black thrill shot through him at the sound of it, at the feel of Paul under him; he shuddered and brought his lips to Paul’s neck, behind his ear, Paul’s hands gripping his shoulder, his upper arms as he began to thrust against him, rubbing their dicks together, electricity bursting through his system, and then suddenly Paul’s legs had spread wider and they were impossibly closer, so close, as Paul pressed a leg high up his side, hooking it round his waist, so close so close—

A wild, possessive feeling took hold of him and he jerked his head up, raised himself higher on his arms despite Paul’s protests, hands on either side of his head, needing to see, to see—

Paul’s eyes were dark and deep and shining and for an instant the image rose powerfully over John as his hips jerked forward—

_Paul on his back, eyes taking him in as his body took him in, all of him, them, together in every way—_

He felt his orgasm ready to rip through him, but wanted to hold on until—

Until—

John lowered his head and bit down on the side of Paul’s neck. Hard.

Paul let out a long moan and then he was coming, and the sight of his face, his eyes shut tight and mouth hanging open in bliss nearly brought John over the edge. He tangled his fingers in Paul’s hair and kissed him, sloppy and uncoordinated, all tongue, and with one final thrust forward into that tight heat he felt something built up and white-hot release inside him as he came hard, spurting onto Paul's body.

 

 

“So what changed your mind in the end?” Paul said, passing him the post-coital cigarette. They were propped up against the headboard; Paul was leaning bonelessly against his chest as he held him loosely, reveling quietly in this small, possessive intimacy. John knew he had a joint stashed somewhere, but he didn’t feel like having a toke at this moment, felt it would tarnish it, somehow.

It took him a moment to register that Paul had asked him a question.

“’Bout what?” John said lazily after taking a long drag. He looked down at the top of Paul’s head.

Paul stilled imperceptibly against him. “The song—you listened to me, in the end.”

John felt as though an ice cube had slipped down through his insides at his words—hadn’t they just—?

“Yeah, well, there’s a first time for everything, Macca,” he sneered, straining to keep his composure.

“Piss off,” Paul said calmly, taking the ciggie back and taking a smoke and John thought maybe he’d let it go. But then he spoke up again, “No really, what was it?”

“You bloody well know,” John said coldly, stiffening, feeling that he should move away but finding he lacked the strength of will to do so, when Paul was so lovely and close up against him.

There was a short, dead silence between them.

“John, I was thinking…” Paul began, eventually, sitting up; John let him reluctantly, feeling as though he was withdrawing from him again, as if they—

“Always a dangerous sign, eh?”

Paul didn’t seem to notice the bitterness in his voice, was too lost in his own thoughts.

“It hurts your fingers, learnin’ to play the guitar at first.”

“Yeah,” John said, not sure what else he could say to that, not sure where this was going, hovering on the precipice of anticipatory dread.

“Some things take time. Like—guitars,” Paul said, faltering on that last bit as if he’d chickened out of being more direct. He took a deep breath and continued, “Like…you’d never know how fuckin’ great it is to play if you didn’t keep at it.”

“Paul…” John said, because suddenly he had an inkling of what Paul was trying to say, was sure he wasn’t talking about guitars, although he wasn’t sure if he meant to stop him, to encourage him, maybe just to steady himself—

Did he mean—? John angled his head, trying to get a better view of Paul, to get a better idea, a fucking idea—

“Because it hurt the first time.”

Then Paul looked directly in his eyes, and John fucking knew he’d meant that, knew what he was talking about. He froze as Paul’s stare bored into him, as though willing him to understand.

“I just—sometime, I— _we_ …” Paul said ambiguously, his search for words failing once more as his voice subsided and John struggled to keep his wild, unsettled elation at bay, to keep from demanding the exact words from Paul that he had found it so hard to give himself. Forced himself to take it for what it was worth, to pull Paul to him gently and not kiss the living daylights out of him, not to go fucking soft on him now.

He had understood, and that was enough.

Sometime…


End file.
